Kiwanis hope post-snow muck won’t hinder Easter egg hunt

Among those concerned as snow kept falling, and falling, and falling last Sunday were members of the Early Bird Kiwanis in Hannibal.

DANNY HENLEYdanny.henley@courierpost.com

Among those concerned as snow kept falling, and falling, and falling last Sunday were members of the Early Bird Kiwanis in Hannibal. “We were nervous,” said Kevin White, club’s vice president.The Kiwanis are wondering if last weekend’s snow will have an impact on this weekend’s Easter egg hunt. The 26th annual event is scheduled Saturday morning at Hannibal-LaGrange University.“What we’re worried about is mud. We don’t want a bunch of muddy kids,” said White. “I’m hoping the snow is gone by Thursday and the wind starts blowing so that by Saturday we can continue to hold this outdoors.”According to the National Weather Service, dry conditions will prevail through Friday, with the daytime high reaching 52 on Friday. There is a 40 percent chance of showers on Saturday.If the soil is too wet the “hunt” will take a different form.“Depending on the ground conditions, we may just hand out Easter eggs,” said White. “We hope to spread them out because that’s more fun for the kids, but we’re going to have it regardless of the weather. HLG is kind enough to open that Mabee Sports Complex, which makes it really nice if we have bad weather.”That the event will go on, rain or shine, is good news to the hundreds of toddlers through 9 year olds who are invited to participate.“We have typically about 800 kids, sometimes more, sometimes less. We’re hoping to get that many this year,” said White, adding that over 8,000 eggs will be put out.If the event is outside, club members and other volunteers will turn out early to set out the eggs.“It takes longer to set them out than it does to pick them up, I’ll tell you that,” laughed White. “We get a lot of help; we have a lot of volunteers. It takes about an hour, to hour-and-a-half to get them set out. It takes about two minutes for them to pick them up.”The cost of the event is covered through different means.“We get a lot of donations and contributions from merchants all around this area and the Quincy area,” said White. “The club does fund-raisers throughout the year to help support this.”The doors of the sports complex will open at 8:30 a.m. Prizes from area merchants will be given away starting at 9 a.m. The egg hunt will start at 10 a.m.Each child will receive a free ticket for prize drawings. Additional tickets will be available for $1 apiece.